Word.ws English Dictionary

scalding

scalding adjective: hot enough to burn. Also the present participle and gerund of scald.

Adjective

scalding (comparative more scalding, superlative most scalding)

  1. Hot enough to burn.
  2. (figuratively) Scorching; scathing.
    • a scalding attack on his critics

Noun (1)

scalding (plural scaldings)

  1. An instance of scalding: a burn.

Noun (2)

scalding (plural scaldings)

  1. (historical) Synonym of escaline, (particularly) the form circulated by Stephen de Fulbourn in Ireland as a debased form of the sterling silver penny, outlawed under Edward I of England.
    Synonyms:
    steeping, escaline

Also used as

scalding is also the present participle and gerund of scald.

Examples of scalding in a sentence

  • "This water is scalding!" Lena explained to me that she had asbestos hands.
  • I saw a woman throw a basin of scalding water over a baby killer.
  • Connie Brown, a torso-tosser in convalescing after scalding one of her main stems.

All 10 example sentences with scalding

Synonyms of scalding

Forms of scalding

Adjective
comparativemore scalding
superlativemost scalding
Noun
pluralscaldings
alternative formstalling

Origin of scalding

From scald + -ing.

From Old French escalin, from Middle Dutch schelling (“shilling”). Doublet of shilling.

Words formed from scalding

Questions about scalding

What does scalding mean?
Scalding means hot enough to burn.
What part of speech is scalding?
Scalding can be an adjective or a noun.

Words near scalding in the dictionary

  1. scaldfish
  2. scaldfishes
  3. scaldhead
  4. scaldheads
  5. scaldic
  6. scalding
  7. scalding hot
  8. scaldingly
  9. scaldings
  10. scaldini
  11. scaldino

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: scalding (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “scalding.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/scalding. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.